Brexit vote: Theresa May survives Brexit vote in Parliament

Britain's Speaker of the House John Bercow, right, in Parliament in London on Dec. 19, 2018.(Photo: AFP/Getty Images)

LONDON – British Prime Minister Theresa May survived an attempt by Parliament to more closely control the nation's exit from the European Union as lawmakers rejected a series of votes on amendments to her widely unpopular withdrawal agreement.

Britain is due to leave the EU on March 29 with or without an EU deal. Parliament entered a new stage in the labyrinthine Brexit process Tuesday: lawmakers attempting to wrest control of Brexit away from Britain's leader.

The move would have undermined Britain's constitutional procedure.

The most significant amendment would have enabled Parliament to force May to delay Brexit if lawmakers could not agree on her EU deal by the departure date in March.

A separate, nonbinding amendment that called on Britain's government to rule out a "no-deal" Brexit – effectively defaulting out of the EU – did pass.

May made it clear she would attempt to break the deadlock in Parliament.

In an address to Parliament, she said she would go back to EU leaders in Brussels and ask them to reopen the deal they spent a year-and-a-half negotiating. May said she would ask for changes to the so-called Irish backstop, a plan that would ensure free trade and travel across the Irish frontier that EU membership allows.

It may be an uphill battle: French President Emmanuel Macron said a new deal would not be negotiated.

The activity in the House of Commons came two weeks after the deal May negotiated with the EU to leave the bloc was overwhelmingly voted down in Britain's Parliament. May survived a "no-confidence" vote that threatened her leadership and cast doubt on whether Brexit would even happen.

For many British lawmakers, the most contentious part of May's EU deal is the Irish "backstop" because it largely leaves unresolved what to do with the land border between Northern Ireland (part of Britain) and Ireland (part of the EU). Years of peace between Northern Ireland’s Irish Catholic community and its British Protestant one have been ensured by the trade and travel across this border without customs checks.

All concerned want to avoid a return to a "hard border" between Northern Ireland and Ireland after Brexit. The "backstop" is a temporary measure to allow the border to remain open in the event that the U.K. and EU fail to reach a free trade deal.

Critics worry it could indefinitely maroon Northern Ireland outside the U.K., in the EU.

An amendment that called for any EU divorce deal to include the removal of the Irish "backstop" passed, reconfirming May's commitment to that effort.

Though May has not been able to negotiate a deal that satisfies lawmakers, the majority of parliamentarians, as well as economists, political scientists and independent analysts, agree leaving the EU without a deal would be a worst-case scenario.

It would mean that decades-old EU legislation covering health, travel, security, trade and more would evaporate with few contingencies March 29.

The Bank of England warned it could cause the deepest recession in Britain in nearly 100 years. A survey by the American Chamber of Commerce estimates it could threaten 1.4 million jobs and $593 billion in direct investment from U.S. companies.

Three million EU nationals who live in Britain under EU "freedom of movement" laws and 1.3 million Britons who do the same in other EU nations would become undocumented.

Executives from Britain's leading supermarkets wrote a letter to the government Monday warning that a "no-deal" Brexit would lead to food shortages and price rises.

Major manufacturers of cars and airplanes, such as Airbus, which employs 14,000 people in Britain, said it could lead to plant closures and job losses. There have been questions raised about potential chaos at sea ports and other borders.

Some lawmakers from May's ruling Conservative Party said Brexit needs to happen whatever the cost. "Taking no deal off the table has been used as a thinly veiled attempt to stop Brexit," Andrea Leadsom wrote in a newspaper column Sunday.

After the vote, European Council President Donald Tusk released a statement.

"The Withdrawal Agreement is and remains the best and only way to ensure an orderly withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union. The backstop is part of the Withdrawal Agreement. The Withdrawal Agreement is not open for re-negotiation."

Prime Minister Theresa May on Monday rejected calls to delay Britain’s departure from the European Union, and said her Plan B was to get her rejected Brexit deal approved by Parliament after securing changes to a contentious Irish border measure.
Time